Chapter 896: I may have made a mistake.
Aelyra’s body left the square like a projectile launched from a divine catapult. There was no elegance in the movement, nor any trace of control. It was simply mass, speed, and destruction compressed into a straight trajectory toward the urban horizon. The air ripped around her in a sharp howl, forming visible waves of pressure that caused flags to break, windows to shatter, and birds to plummet in panic from rooftops. For a few seconds, the entire capital could follow a line of devastation crossing the low sky between towers and avenues.
She first collided with a white stone side bell tower, tearing the structure from its top as if it were made of dried clay. Enormous blocks tumbled onto adjacent streets, raising thick clouds of dust and desperate cries. Without losing enough speed to stop, her body continued through suspended arches, noble walkways, and elevated gardens of the central district. Ornamental trees were uprooted. Centuries-old statues toppled as they were struck by debris hurled by the shockwave. On the way to the Celestial Palace, Aelyra crashed against the outer black marble wall that surrounded the imperial gardens. The impact opened a grotesque circular breach in the structure, scattering sharp splinters dozens of meters away. Guards positioned in the towers barely had time to duck before seeing something bloodied pierce the main defense and continue on without slowing down enough. Bronze alarms began to sound immediately, hammering the fortress with deep, urgent notes.
"INVASION!"
The cry spread through the outer corridors like wildfire. Inner gates began to close. Troops rushed in incomplete formation. Mages on standby hurried out of their ritual chambers, still wearing half-worn robes. Captains bellowed contradictory orders while servants abandoned trays and hid under staircases. No one knew what was happening, only that something powerful had just breached the main wall.
This "thing" entered the first side hall of the palace an instant later. Aelyra burst through the outer wall like a meteor of flesh and blood. Columns cracked in two on impact. Ancient tapestries caught fire as they touched fallen torches. Her body ricocheted across the polished floor, passed through two interior partitions, and carved a deep furrow in the marble before colliding again with another wall and shattering it into fragments. Servants setting the table for a nighttime banquet threw themselves to the floor in panic as silver plates and wine flew in all directions.
She hadn’t stopped yet.
She raced down an entire corridor, taking monumental doors with her, and only lost real speed when she struck the pedestal of an ancient imperial statue. The base shattered. The sculpture toppled forward and collapsed on top of her with a final thud that reverberated through several sections of the palace.
Then came silence.
Dust filled the air like a thick fog. Lanterns flickered. Small stones continued to fall from the ceiling at nervous intervals. Guards surrounded the area with raised spears, shields at the ready, and tense expressions, certain that a monstrous enemy would emerge from the rubble at any moment.
A captain advanced first, breathing too rapidly for someone trained.
"Containment formation! Mages in the rear! If they move, shoot them down!"
Two conjurers began to chant spells. An archer climbed onto a pile of debris to get a better view. Other soldiers swallowed hard as they aimed at the center of the open crater in the destroyed corridor.
The dust slowly settled.
What appeared was not an unknown monster.
It was Aelyra.
Or something so brutally destroyed that it took seconds to recognize her.
Her body was partially buried between broken stone and pieces of the fallen statue. Her hair, once long and flawless, was now singed, torn out in pieces, and stuck to coagulated blood. Her face was swollen in several places, with dark burn marks crisscrossing her skin. One eye was barely distinguishable amidst the bruising. Her right arm bent at an angle too unnatural to be true. Her left leg trembled in involuntary spasms beneath the rubble.
But the worst part was the blood.
There was blood everywhere.
On the floor, on the shattered walls, on the marble fragments, on the torn tapestries, even on the guards who were too close to the impact. Aelyra was covered from head to toe, as if she had been immersed in blood. Almost no intact skin was visible. Each of her breaths came in small, wet gasps.
The captain paled.
"By heavens..."
A soldier dropped his spear without realizing it.
Another took two steps back and made the imperial protection sign with trembling fingers.
"It’s... it’s Monarch Aelyra."
The phrase coursed through them like poison.
"Who did this?"
"How does someone enter the palace like that?"
"Is she alive?"
"Call healers! Now!"
Chaos reorganized itself into pure panic. Some ran to find medics. Others tried to lift the rubble, not knowing where to touch without worsening the wounds. A mage knelt beside her and immediately recoiled upon feeling monstrous residues of mana still burning on her body, as if the aggressive energy remained clinging to her flesh even after the impact.
"Don’t touch without restraint!" he shouted. "There’s still residual hostile energy!"
Aelyra tried to move her head. A faint noise escaped her throat, something between a cough and hatred. Blood trickled from her mouth and dripped onto the shattered marble.
At that instant, quick footsteps echoed through the destroyed corridor.
Shalom appeared running between the soldiers, pushing two guards aside without ceremony. Her expression was one of anticipated irritation, like someone who already knew exactly what she would find and hated being right. When she saw the extent of the damage, she slowed her pace.
She stopped before the crater.
She observed all of Aelyra for a few seconds in absolute silence.
Then she let out a long sigh.
"I warned you..."
The soldiers looked at her, unsure if it was cruelty or exhaustion.
Shalom crouched beside the fallen Monarch and inclined her head, studying the wounds with cold pragmatism. She lightly touched a burn on her shoulder and immediately withdrew her fingers upon feeling the residue of mana.
"He really went easy on her," she murmured.
The captain nearly choked.
"Did you go easy on her?"
Shalom gave him such a dry look that he regretted speaking.
"If you wanted to kill her, you’d be collecting body parts in different neighborhoods."
No one answered.
Even the most skeptical felt a chill run down their spines.
Aelyra moved her swollen lips, trying to form words. Shalom moved her face closer.
"What?"
Her voice came out in painful fragments.
"...I’m going to... kill..."
Shalom closed her eyes for a second, exhausted.
"Of course you will."
She stood up and pointed to the healers who were finally arriving with boxes of instruments and restoration talismans.
"Stabilize her lung, spine, and internal bleeding first. The arm can wait. The leg too. And get that statue off her before she dies humiliated twice."
Some guards almost laughed out of nervous reflex, then remembered where they were.
The healers began working at a frantic pace. Green and gold lights enveloped Aelyra’s battered body. Coagulation spells sealed open cuts. Talismans burned over broken ribs. One of them looked at Shalom, confused.
"What kind of weapon caused this?"
Shalom crossed his arms.
"A foot."
The man blinked several times.
"Excuse me?"
"An angry foot."
On the other side of the corridor, new officers arrived rushing in, among them messengers from the Celestial Emperor. Upon seeing the scene, many completely lost their composure. One scribe dropped scrolls on the floor. Another turned his back to vomit discreetly behind a cracked column.
The news would spread through the palace like wildfire.
Aelyra, Monarch of the Stormy Tides, had returned to the palace not for honor, triumph, or ceremonial escort.
She had returned hurled down.
Shalom observed the destroyed corridor, the panicked guards, and the bloodied woman struggling to breathe amidst emergency treatments. Then she rubbed her forehead and spoke too softly for almost everyone to hear.
"And I still have to explain this to the Emperor."
In the distance, more alarms continued to sound. The entire Celestial Palace awoke to the humiliation etched in blood on its own walls.
Shalom looked at the city... "It seems we will see each other again..." She spoke before sighing and disappearing.
—
The square still bore the immediate scars of the confrontation. Dust hung in the air like thick fog, slowly pierced by the golden light of the late afternoon. Destroyed stalls lay toppled beside cracked streets, broken shop windows reflected the chaos in irregular fragments, and the central fountain, once a tranquil symbol of the commercial avenue, gushed water haphazardly after being violently ripped from its natural course. People began to emerge from makeshift hiding places, cautiously opening doors, peeking through cracks and windows, like animals testing whether the storm had truly passed.
In the midst of that partial devastation, Strax stood still as if nothing around him concerned him. There was no hurry in his movements, nor any trace of exhaustion after the violence he had just displayed. His posture was relaxed, almost nonchalant, but there was still something heavy in the air near him, as if the recent fury had left invisible residues floating around his body. The ground where he stood retained light darkened marks, a consequence of the monstrous pressure of mana that had escaped moments before.
Ouroboros approached slowly.
She walked among broken stones and scattered planks, dodging debris with a silent elegance that seemed natural even in the most absurd circumstances. Her eyes observed Strax with genuine attention, not out of fear of him, but out of enough familiarity to recognize when his silence meant calm and when it meant something more dangerous. Upon reaching him, she lightly touched the side of his arm, as she had done before.
"Is everything alright?" she asked, in a low, firm, and clear voice despite the chaos around her. Strax took a few seconds to answer. His eyes scanned the direction where he had thrown Aelyra, as if he could still see across the entire city the straight line of destruction her body had traced to the Celestial Palace. Then he let out a long, almost bored sigh.
"Maybe not," he said. "Maybe I made a mistake leaving her alive."
Ouroboros tilted his head slightly, studying him.
He shrugged.
"But who cares?"
The phrase came out without grandeur, almost casual, like someone commenting on the chance of rain the next day. Still, anyone listening would perceive the hidden weight behind the simplicity. To Strax, Aelyra’s life at that moment seemed to have the same strategic value as a broken glass or a warped door.
Ouroboros observed his face for a moment. There was irritation there, but not loss of control. The problem wasn’t blind rage. It was something worse: a cold decision fueled by personal offense. "You’re serious," she said.
"I’m almost always serious when I’m too quiet."
She let out a small sigh through her nose, something close to a tired laugh. Around them, some local guards were finally gathering the courage to approach, but still kept too respectful a distance to seem helpful. None wanted to be the man who would step wrong near Strax in that state.
He ran a hand through his hair and looked at the sky, now slowly clearing of the clouds Aelyra had tried to summon.
"If that idiot plots revenge again," he continued, "I’ll kill her in the worst way possible."
